NEWLY registered nurses and medical staff who join inpatient services in one NHS Trust are set to be awarded with a £3,000 signing bonus.

The welcome bonus will be awarded to those who join the Cumbria, Northumberland, Tyne and Wear NHS Foundation Trust (CNTW), with hopes of addressing short-term staff shortages.

The payment will take effect as of December 27.

Chief nurse of the trust, Gary O'Hare said the bonus will hope to combat "unprecedented times".

"Our staff have been placed under enormous strain through the pandemic and have responded admirably to the challenge, but we recognise the day-to-day difficulties in maintaining the right staffing levels.

“Having a full qualified staffing complement, if achieved, would help produce further savings and more importantly enable us to provide a more therapeutic and supportive environment on wards.

"We will continue to explore further options for incentivising staff to join the Trust and support improvements to help meet the needs of the people we serve.”

The incentive is part of trust's pledge to continually improve the health and wellbeing of their staff.

The bonus will divided with £1,500 being included within the employees first annual salary and with the remainder being split over the course of two years in employment.